A influência da natureza das tarefas na perceção dos alunos quanto à sua aprendizagem

Abstract

In the Mathematics teaching context, the term task has a very particular meaning. In this article we propose to investigate how the task’s nature offered in the classroom can influence the students’ perception about their learning. Given the acknowledged difficulties in implementing certain tasks, we will focus our interest especially in learning based on problem solving. Thus, we realized three observations of Mathematics classes of students in High School, in order to observe mainly the nature of the most frequently used type of task, and we prepared observation grids, as well as questionnaires (applied to the observed students). The results show that tasks with an open nature are not used in class, that the teacher uses twice the exercises compared with problems, and that the students, not being very familiar with this kind of activity, feel that what they are used to do is the best way to build their knowledge.